[Hmm, do you have bingo in the rest of the world? The idea is, each player has a card marked with a randomly chosen subset of a set of numbers/items/sayings/whatever, and there is a caller, who calls out in turn a randomly chosen element of the whole set. If you have that element on your card, you cross it off. The first person who has a card with every element crossed off shouts "Bingo!" and wins. Old ladies play it in converted cinemas.]

This morning I crossed off:

"We have lots of children like [DS7] [implied, in his strong subject]"

"We'd keep him with his age group for at least some maths lessons"

"We think it's not good for them to take exams too early"

"EQ is at least as important as IQ"

What else might be on a school bingo card?

We can teach all students in heterogeneous classes through *differentiated instruction*.

"but then what will she take in high school"

"I knew a kid who was grade-skipped once, and it didn't end well."

"What about sports? He/She will be so much smaller than the others."

"ALL children benefit from exposure to GATE (GT) instruction"

"WHEN I offer more challenging work, your child often refuses that as well."

"We CAN'T give her more challenging work or advance her until she shows she can do this work."

"Talking to you as a mother, not a teacher, don't you think that you have just given him too much too soon?"

"After 3rd grade, all the kids even out."

"If you let him move ahead, where will he be in 10 years?"

"He needs to focus on his coloring and scissor skills."

"I know he knows all of it already, but he needs to complete all his work before I give him something more challenging."

Oh... and the best one.... "He is not allowed to read books in my classroom."

If I had a dollar for everytime I'd heard that in the past 3 years, I could afford a fancy private school lol!!!

"Even if you chose this homeschool option, we don't provide subject acceleration because what would happen if you put her back in regular school?"

duh...I think I would not be putting her in a school that can't meet her needs again

Eek. I'm guessing MEA?

"If I let your child read at rest time, then I have to let all the kids read"
(GOD forbid kids read in school!)
"She can do the work,but better that she is bored now rather than when they run out of things to teach her in upper grades."
"She's not gifted, she is an exceptional test taker."
"We have lots of kids just like her, we challenge every student."

If you have "lots" of kids like mine, why is MINE the only one that seems to be having behavior problems?

We cant test to see if she is ready for first grade, there are no tests.

I was told this by a homeschool charter school.

"Giving your child different work isn't fair to the other kids."

"We just don't do grade-skipping in this district."

"We can't give him accelerated work in math because he needs work on social skills"

"We won't give him a test to see if he's ready for Algebra because only a teacher can make that determination. We can't take the word of his elementary school teachers either because they don't know what we teach in middle school"

"He can't know that already because we haven't taught it yet"

"We don't want to hurt his self-esteem by giving him harder work"

"What will we teach him next year if we accelerate him to 5th grade math now?" -- (school is K-5, DS is in 3rd)

Ouch!

"I don't care how "bright" she is, she needs to learn that sometimes you just have to do boring things."

"We have LOTS of VERY bright children" (heavily implying that my child is not one of them)

"We don't see it"

"You understand we can't do readers with her of course" (apparently "readers" = dirty word)

"The other children will do the extension work, but she isn't interested in that either"

Hearing all of these reminds me of my mental list of things NOT to say during the parent-teacher conference. My favorite:

"Well, if you're going to continue to teach 'the cat sat on the mat,' could you at least open the windowshade so he'll have something interesting to look at?"

"2e is a comfort phrase for parents who have a hard time accepting a SpEd child."
"2e means consulting with the classroom, not direct services."
"If she wouldn't get upset when she is frustrated, we would consider alternatives."

"You can't identify a gifted child until the 3rd grade."

BINGO! lol! ugh!!!!

My jaw dropped reading this. What did you say???????

Oh yes - have I heard that one. And the ancillary, "he has been exposed to inappropriate materials for his age."

*snicker* This reminds me of the time my dad had me read aloud from one of his college engineering texts for his friends. I was 4 probably. Then I explained what I just read...lol!

"All children are gifted in our school district."

"Everyone thinks their child is a genius."

"These early readers may be able to decode the words, but they really don't have the comprehension."

"Well, you could switch her to the gifted school, but that's really more for VERY gifted children..." (We switched her. DD's first report card at the gifted school= straight As.)

"She doesn't work ahead in the math book like some of the other children do. She chooses to read solo instead." (= "Why she didn't need math acceleration")

"It's okay if she already knows the material because extra practice (on math concepts that she's known for years) is good for her."

Principal: "she has to be able to behave well in class before we will consider adding any differentiation"

Us: "Her behavior was great until she got tired of repeatedly telling everyone she was bored and being ignored."

Principal: "I think if you will put a videocamera in her room, you will be surprised at the behavior you see"

[later that same year...]

Principal: "I know that the school for exceptionally gifted is great at meeting the needs for those who qualify, but that's not what we're dealing with here" (our DD qualified later that month).

The above was for DD who is now 11 and thriving at the awesome gifted school. Fast forward a few years to teacher conference for DD6, who is already starting to have behavior problems (in 1st grade):

Teacher: "she's not ready for the 1 day/week pullout program. She needs more classroom time first because there are gaps in her learning."

You would think that with an older sibling who has paved the way, it would get easier the 2nd time around... but so far, we are on the exact same path. And we even sent DD6 to an expensive private school for early-entrance Kindy to avoid the boredom for a couple of years until we could hopefully get her into the exceptionally gifted school. Once again, we can't even get her into the one day/week pullout program.

"Have you thought about doing something else with your child?" i.e. homeschool or private school
- I wanted to say "I've only thought about it every day since we've had a change in administration."

I did get one bit of input from the District Superintendent at a meeting we had. There are some children whose academic needs may not be met by public school, but we will try to meet your sons. I liked the honesty in her response and the district has been very accommodating.

Ditto.

Our principal, who has been extremely helpful, recently said, "I don't believe in private school, but that might be the best option for your son."

BINGO! Only they were talking about me...

Regarding my youngest dd.....Did you know your daughter knows all the months of the year? (from her kindergarten teacher) with a giggle..yes she's known them for a while. (she knew and could say them at 18 months)

Last year's 1st grade teacher "Your son wasn't selected for the GT program due to his behavior." *sigh*

Me: you're showing me these test results that are really exceptional, that show all this great potential. Then you tell me she's got a fine placement, because her work is barely below average for her class. What about accommodations that would allow her to work at her potential?

Principal: we get that question a lot. The truth is, we don't have the resources- or the responsibility- to do that.

We pulled her from the school two weeks later.